A GOOD MAN'S FUTURE EXISTENCE. Nube non è ch' oscuri vostra luce, L'ore distinte a voi non fanno forza, Caso o necessità non vi conduce.-MICHAEL ANGELO. Eternal life! If all the winds of heaven might be concentrated to fill the trump that should proclaim it, the blast would be but too feeble for the theme! If all the constellations of our firmament were grouped afresh to blazon those few letters on the vault of heaven, the matter would be more than worthy of the legend.-SHEPPARD. As heavenly bodies through the ether move Thus above passions that around the throng He to the stock of human happiness way. When gone, remembrance of what he has been, T Fraught with a solar life, unworn by change The source eterne of all its virtues, powers; No damps like those from earth arising tame No mists there intercept the light of grace No cares that here thwart purposed good distract Developed partially in grosser clay Far higher in degree, the same in kind, With him of life the social charities, That, as he wills, pour forth around their strength, The stream thus from obstructing weeds released As fabled trees for ever blossoming, And rich with fruit of autumn pride and spring, There glow matured by light and heat the power And will to do, the fruitage and the flower. Of life the ascending vista on the soul Away, progressing still the glorious sprite, A cloudless perspective! with which the past The soul, on brightening pinions upward soaring, Here, to enjoy in their most perfect mood; To view in sweet communion with the loved On earth, Heaven's folded counsels there evolved? NOTES ΤΟ "A GOOD MAN'S FUTURE EXISTENCE." P. 273, 1. 1, 2. As heavenly bodies through the ether move "The propagation of sound, however, requires a much denser medium than light or heat; its intensity diminishes as the rarity of the air increases, so that at a very small height above the surface of the earth the noise of the tempest ceases, and the thunder is heard no more in those boundless regions where the heavenly bodies accomplish their periods in eternal and sublime silence."-SOMERVILLE's Connection of the Physical Sciences, 2nd ed. p. 260. P. 275, 1. 9. As fabled trees for ever blossoming. See Ariosto's description of the Garden of Logistilla, Canto x. Stanzas 62, 63. Also, Spenser's description of the "Garden of Adonis," Book iii. Canto vi. Stanza 42. |